The Scottish Witch by Cathy Maxwell

The second installment in The Chattan Curse trilogy, by Cathy Maxwell,  is now available. You may remember the first novel in the series, Lyon’s Bride, from earlier this year. The Scottish Witch introduces Portia MacLean, a spinster whose mother has rested all hopes for the family on her lovely sister, Minerva, making a smart match with a wealthy gentleman. When Portia finds a book of spells, and she learns that the handsome Lord Chattan is running about the countryside looking for a witch who can break the curse that rests in his family thanks to a woman scorned generations past, who took her life and whose mother hexed the entire male line of the family for eternity, the lovely spinster decides to pretend to be a witch so she can take the money he is offering, and use it to pay for the rent and help her family survive without marrying for money.

But her encounter with Lord Chattan is not what she expects. When she tries to walk away from him, he only pursues her, and she finds that she cannot escape his attentions-or perhaps she doesn’t want to escape them? Before she realizes it, the two are bound to one another by fate and forced to confront the family curse together, or lose the chance at love forever.

This novel is a “by the book” bodice ripper, complete with passion, romance, and historical lords and ladies who can’t seem to leave one another alone. If you like romance novels of the simpler variety, this one should not be missed!

Safe Within by Jean Reynolds Page

Elaine Forsyth and her fading husband, Carson, moved into her parents’ full-sized treehouse by the lake so that he can spend his remaining days in peace. Moving back to where they grew up brings up some old, un-faced issues that Elaine finds herself confronted with at every turn. Her mother-in-law, Greta, has never approved of Elaine, and refuses to talk to her or acknowledge that her son is the father of Elaine’s son, Mick. Mick is dealing with his own skeletons, as he spends the summer with his mother, grieving the loss of his father and tracing his old steps, only to find that there is a secret involving his past girlfriend that everyone in town seems to know about, except for him.

This is a novel about tieing up the loose ends of your life and finding closure where you least expect it, and it is a novel about making your own family, regardless of history or even genetics-family and life are what you make them. Grief, loss, and letting go of the past so you can move forward, all factor into this surprisingly uplifting story by Jean Reynolds Page, which stresses that even though you can’t change the past, you can always try to do better with the present.

If you like women’s fiction you will enjoy this novel, especially if you liked A Simple Thing by Kathleen McCleary, or The Roots of the Olive Tree by Courtney Miller Santo.

Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness

Diana Bishop is back in the second installment in the All Souls Trilogy-the first book of which was called A Discovery of Witches and was insanely popular among paranormal romance readers. In Shadow of Night, Diana and the sexy vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont have time traveled back to Elizabethan England to find the famous manuscript, Ashmole 782,  that started the saga in the first novel. Diana and Matthew must get the manuscript to keep it out of the wrong hands, and every supernatural creature wants the book for his kind, and is willing to take out Diana and Matthew in the process-but the hero and heroine are determined to save the supernatural world by preserving the book and the current status quo between the species.

Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, Queen Elizabeth, and MANY other historical figures make their way into the plot of the story, so if you love historical fiction, you will be tickled by the references made and the excellent attention to detail that the author, Deborah Harkness, is well-known for. If you read the first novel, you won’t want to miss the second, and if you haven’t, I suggest you start from the beginning!

Readers who enjoyed The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane, by Katherine Howe, and The Witch’s Daughter, by Paula Brackston, will love the A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night. Paranormal romance with a touch of history and elements of magic with hints of time travel….

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

Clary Fray is a teenage girl with normal teenage problems-or so she thinks. One evening, in a dance club, she witnesses a murder-and her entire reality becomes a lie. Living right beside her, her entire life, have been supernatural beings threatening to war against one another. The disappearance of her mother, followed by an encounter with a horrible monster in her own apartment draw her in to a world unlike anything she has ever known.

This Young Adult/Teen novel is the first novel of The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. Clary befriends The Shadowhunters in an alliance to find her mother and bring balance back to the universe, fighting against a grave enemy that is connected to her in a way she would never imagine. If you love this series, be sure to check out her Infernal Devices series, which is set in the same fantasy world.

If you are the type of adult who enjoys a good teen paranormal fiction novel (Twilight, etc), then you won’t want to miss this series, which has family values, friendship, a touch of romance, and a whole lot of good versus evil…

Forgotten by Catherine McKenzie

Emma Tupper is a lawyer with plans to make partner at her prestigious law firm. When her mother passes away and leaves her with an all-expenses paid trip to Africa in her will, asking her to experience it in her absence, Emma has a hard time resisting the trip. But things do not go according to her mother’s plan. Emma becomes ill, then gets trapped in the middle of nowhere in Africa after an earthquake hits. She is gone from home for 6 months before she finally makes it back into “civilization”.

Emma is surprised to find that everything is NOT as she left it when she returns home. Her apartment has been leased to someone else, her possessions disposed of, and her boyfriend has already moved on-with the last person she ever would have expected. She is forced to start her career over again. Everyone seems to expect her to do something drastic and extreme, after having a major life event change everything for her. But Emma just wants to go back to the way things were-with the exception of inviting handsome, newly single photographer Dominic into her life.

Can Emma go back to they way things were? Does she really want to go back? What would YOU change, if you lost everything and had to start over?

Forgotten, by Catherine McKenzie, is a novel about deciding what you value most in life, and bravely moving forward when you have been knocked down by life and have to put pieces back together that no longer fit like they should. If you like this novel, be sure to pick up Arranged, by the same author, which is about a woman who decides to use an arranged marriage service to find a husband (and everything goes terribly wrong).

The Midwife of Hope River by Patricia Harman

Patience Murphy is a midwife in Appalachia during the Depression, in a time when the Ku Klux Klan was showing it’s ugly face, and when the local doctor refuses to help colored women in labor. She lives to help others, but she lives in fear-Patience has her own ugly secrets-a dark past that hangs over her and could ruin her life if her secret got out.

This is a novel about unlikely relationships that become lifelong friendships, the pain of loss, the healing powers of love and compassion, and the heart that comes out when people have nothing else to give. The hardship of the area and the times will bring tears to your eyes as you read this novel and imagine what it might have been like to try and make, then raise, a family during a time of intense poverty when medicine was not advanced, or simply unavailable to the lower classes. Desperate times bring forth some very productive change, and the lessons learned by this kind, stubborn midwife as she travels her path, helping the birthing women of Appalachia and learning that love has no cost and no color.

This novel is NOT for anyone who is squeamish about childbirth related topics. The births are quite graphic and the description in the entire novel is breathtaking-which means that if you can’t talk  about placenta or umbilical cords you should probably leave this one alone. If you like to read novels that step outside the box, The Midwife of Hope River , by Patricia Harman, is one of the most eloquently written pieces of women’s fiction on shelves today.

Flash and Bones by Kathy Reichs

Temperance Brennan returns in this forensic anthropology mystery, Flash and Bones. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Kathy Reichs’ work, Flash and Bones is the 14th novel in the Temperance Brennan series, which circles around a Forensic Anthropologist who helps to identify bodies that are damaged beyond recognition or skeletons in the U.S. and in Canada. This series brought about the very popular mystery television series called Bones.

Flash and Bones takes place in Charlotte, North Carolina, during Race Week. A body is found in the local dump, near the race track, and some unsolved mysteries from decades past resurface. It’s up to Tempe to sort through the clues and find an identity for the body, despite the fact that the FBI seems to want her off the case. Some very shady individuals are hanging around the race track lately, and one man claims that his sister who disappeared decades ago was murdered, and it has something to do with the last place she was seen-the track.

Will Tempe solve the murder before the murderer gets his hands on her to keep her quiet? What is the FBI trying to cover up?

True to the author’s usual style, you won’t find out the solution until all of the shady characters and clues have been laid out before you…And a sexy Private Investigator is starting to show some interest in the Forensic Anthropologist too…

If you like murder mysteries and don’t mind reading about them from a Forensic/Medical Examiner kind of vantage (it can be very descriptive), then you will want to check out this series. I suggest you start at the beginning, however, if you want to give them a try. (Otherwise her love life doesn’t make much sense).